A Short Entry for Christine

(So she doesn't feel alone in wedding-planning madness.)

Wedding planning is finally under way. And by "under way," I mean we have one appointment at one potential venue next week. And this potential venue is potentially out of our budget, unless we keep our guest list to about 50. Which, honestly, is all we really have in terms of close friends and family, so it IS doable.

We decided to get hitched in January. Both of us had always imagined a spring or summer wedding, but decided that time of year is less important than my brother being there. Plus, Alex continues to worry that I will suddenly change my mind, so for him: the sooner the better.

So... that leaves us about 6 months to plan a wedding. Which is plenty of time, really. But given my tendency to procrastinate (and also fight with my mom when she tries to get me back on track), this could get hairy.

You're My Friends, Too

Has it really been since January 3 since I last posted? I am surprised Blogger didn't just up and delete my account, figuring I'd never be back. Holy crap.

Anyway, those of you who are my "friend" on facebook may or may not have (may not have being more likely, because I doubt anyone is wasting time thinking about this) noticed, January is about the time I jumped on the FB wagon and became a poster of tidbits. What am I doing now? How do I feel about the weather? What kind of day did I have? What am I eating for dinner? All of my life wrapped up into neat little one-liners.

This has been good for me. Work has been so hectic, it is a rare day that I can come home and compose more than one sentence at a time. And even though it is hectic, I still love it... So the need to vent isn't really there. And then there's the stability of my relationship. And so before I loved my job and had a stable relationship, my blog was about my ridiculous job and my adventures in dating and then there was the filler stuff about my dogs and my occasional forays into the kitchen. But that filler stuff does not an interesting blog make.

Or does it? Or do I really care? I don't know. I suppose if I have trouble coming up with coherent paragraphs (which, clearly, I have having trouble with right now), I can write single line snippets about things I already posted on facebook, like

• I am engaged.
• Coconut has pink eye. She is on a 10 day, 3 times per day regimen of eye drops and ointments. Poor baby keeps rubbing her face up against the couch. I hope I don't get it.
• My dad taught me how to change an electrical outlet last week and then I practiced by changing about 10 of them at my grandma's shore house.
• I watched the season finale of Idol while drinking wine and eating frozen pizza. Good times.

Or things that I don't really want to write on Facebook, like

• I wonder how to get my dogs to stop eating their own shit without following them around and scooping up after them, because they don't just leave it alone until I can clean it up on the weekend. I've tried sprinkling it with cayenne pepper, thinking that if they tasted a couple turds that were too spicy, they'd think ALL turds were spicy and thus undelicious. Following them around for a few days sprinkling cayenne on all the poop would be easier than following them around FOREVER cleaning up all the poop. It didn't work-- they think cayenne-covered shit is just as tasty as plain. Anyway, something's gotta be done. It's not making them sick, but it sure as hell makes me sick when they belch ass-smell into my face.
• I've been doing Weight Watchers since February and have lost 16 lbs, which is great and all... better than nothing, better than gaining, weight stays off longer when it comes off slower, blah blah blah blah. It's taking too long and I know it's my own fault for being so lax about it and not exercising, and still the fact that I am paying for it every month makes me feel like I should be losing weight anyway, without really trying. It's not working that way, obv, and I'm getting frustrated. My plan is to join Curves come summer. I know it's not a REAL gym, but it's something. I don't have to mess around with weights. I can't use weather as an excuse. It's a full body workout. Fast. Easy. SOMETHING. Better than nothing, see?
• I don't want to plan my wedding. I want to be married. But the wedding planning? Blech. And it's not that I don't care what my wedding is like. I do... I just don't want to be the one to make it that way. Also, I wanted to have it sometime within the next year, but my brother is being deployed in February for 6 months, so unless we hurry up and do it in January, I have to wait until at least September of 2010. That's a long-ass time away, and the whole thing just makes me mad. It makes me mad at my stupid brother for joining the guard just to get the signing bonus, and then it makes me feel guilty because if something were to happen to him over there, really, my wedding would be irrelevant, and on top of it all, it makes me feel like I'm being some kind of ridiculous bridezilla whiner for being annoyed that I can't have my wedding exactly when I had initially planned. In short, I become a grump whenever people ask me IF I'VE SET A FUCKING DATE YET NO I HAVE NOT!!!! See? Grumpy.

And, A-HA! Apparently I still have some rant left in me. The Frizz Chronicles can survive after all!

Fangs

When the whole Harry Potter craze started, I thought it was stupid and resisted reading the books for quite some time. Then my college roomie (hi Meg!) was given the first one for Christmas, and she read it, and she made me read it, and thus began a love affair.

I kind of thought the same thing would happen with the Stefanie Meyer Twilight series. I decided I was not going to read it, but then a coworker left an audio copy of the book in the faculty room with the sign "Anyone care to listen?" and I figured, eh, it's free, I can listen during my commute, TONS OF PEOPLE LOVE THIS BOOK IT CAN'T BE ALL THAT BAD!

People, I freakin hated this book. It is possible that the narrator's annoying voice and the awful way she said the protagonist's name, "Beh-lah," set me up not to like it from the very beginning. Maybe had I actually read it instead of listening to it, I would have liked it better. But honestly, I couldn't stand Bella as a character, and I spent the entire book thinking, "Jesus Christ just BITE HER ALREADY!!!!!"

I thought the book was corny and poorly written. I am actually a little upset that my mom just read it and then rushed out to get the next book in the series! Having no one to make fun of this book with bums me out big time.

The life

While you were busy cleaning up our poop, JESSICA, we dogs were having the BEST YEAR EVER!!!

New Year's Resolution: Pick Up Dog Shit

I have been a dog owner for a year and a half now. I have been a two-dog owner for the last 11 weeks.

I have never picked up dog poop in my own yard.

Stop! Now before you go getting all judgy judgy on me, I'd like to point out that during the time when we only had Coconut, there were only very small turds scattered around the yard, and most of them were sucked up by the lawn mower, and I don't think that anyone other than me has ever stepped in a pile while back there.

If you're still in the mood to judge, judge this: I bought this contraption

this morning, and then spent an hour walking the yard like a grid and scooping up every last solitary frozen piece of dog shit. I even scraped up the smashed-in ones!

I filled two entire large plastic grocery bags, and honestly, I was surprised by the weight of them! I had to fight the urge to bring the bags into my house and put them on the scale!

Which, oddly, brings me to this:

Alex's worst insults for people always tend to have "bag" tagged onto the end. Dickbag, Assbag, the ever popular Douchebag... you get the point. I asked him about this once, and he said that calling someone a bag of something is even harsher than calling them just that one undesirable thing.

I never really thought about it again until today. A shitbag is WAY worse than one single shit.

Snippets

My house is uncommonly calm right now. I have a homemade soup simmering on the stove, and when I sat down to do some web-browsing, Marley helped herself to a spot on the couch and Coconut took her pre-Marley post as my blogging partner by sitting on my lap and watching the cursor travel across the screen.

*****

Thanksgiving was pretty good this year. We feasted at my parents' house, and Alex's mom and brother joined us. My brother was home for a change (he was deployed the last two Thanksgivings), and with the exception of A's brother (who was strangely quiet and made an abrupt departure), everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

*****

Last Sunday we did Marley's mange treatment. She was a trooper during the bath, but I felt soooo bad sticking her soaking wet into a crate and making her air-dry. After about 30 minutes of watching her sit there and shiver, I took a hair dryer to her. (We have borrowed a space heater from my parents for next time.) She spent the next two days sleeping like a log, waking only to eat and go outsite, and her skin is still red and raw in some places. I can't believe we have to do this at least 3 more times.

*****

Alex's birthday was last Friday. I gave him some golf club he hasn't shut up about for the last year and a half. On Saturday night we went to Harrah's. It's not our favorite casino, but it's the only place we've ever won anything significant. We had dinner at the new McCormick & Schmick's they have there. We were both totally unimpressed-- my Fresh Seafood Mixed Grill was bland, and the risotto it was served on was tasty but mushy. Alex asked for a crabcake alongside his filet mignon, and the waitress ended up bringing him an entire crabcake entree in addition to his filet entree. He was scared to send it back for fear that someone might spit in his dessert, so that ended up costing us an extra $30. Also, we didn't really win anything.

*****

My cousin's Bat Mitzvah was two weeks ago. My mom made the interesting observation that no one seems to dance anymore unless it is a choreographed dance like the Cha Cha Slide. Apparently it is more about knowing the words to every song. Most of the teens just kind of bounced around in groups, yelling lyrics at each other. The high point (for me, anyway) was when my brother and Alex won the dance contest. The couples dance contest. As a couple. We also got my grandma to don a giant pink fur pimp hat and red aviator sunglasses. I have already ordered the picture of that one from the photog's website.

Marley and Alex and Me

The test results came back for Marley's most recent poo sample, and not only did the giardia not go away, but she has roundworms too. Giardia AND mange AND roundworms. Her little body is teeming with all these disgusting parasites. Her nickname has become Buggy, and I continue to feel more and more sorry for her. Apparently, the one dose of heartworm meds (that also prevent some other worms) that she has had since we got her was not enough to protect her from the dangers of eating rabbit turds. You might remember, I had this same issue with Coconut when we first got her, but she (knock on wood) managed to avoid catching anything. Anyway, now Marley is on three different oral meds, and we'll be doing her first mange dip tomorrow.

*****

In other news, and yes, there are other things going on in my life, I have perhaps the best boyfriend ever. I came home on Thursday (Alex's day off), and he had cleaned the whole main floor of our house, including floors, cooked dinner, did all his laundry, and even bought me a medicated Chap Stick (although that was probably for selfish reasons, wink wink, har har). When I opened the cabinet to get my coffee mug the next morning, I saw that he organized all the tupperware, and when I opened the closet to get my coat, all of the shit that used to be on the floor in there was gone.

Now I sort of feel guilty for sitting around all day today, like maybe I should have cleaned the bathroom and stuff instead. But obviously I don't feel that guilty, because here I sit, blogging away.

*****

Kid-Bit (it's back!)

Sometimes, because my students aren't entirely... aware of what goes on around them, I forget to watch what I say. The other day, one of my aides received a giant bouquet of flowers, and explained to us that they were sent from her boyfriend, who she fought with the night before. The fight ended in him saying, "fuck you," and her throwing him out of her house. "So they are Eff You flowers, " I said.

And my little A repeated, "A FEW FLOWERS!"

"That's right!" I told him, "A few flowers."

More Dog Stuff

So remember how a couple weeks ago I was all, "Take That, Vet Office Lady!" because I asked her if Marley's hair loss was due to her parasite, and she said no, and I found information to the contrary online?

Um, Marley has Mange.

I feel so bad for her. When I took her to the vet on Wednesday night, they knew immediately when they saw her. Still, they did several skin scrapings to be sure. I am tempted to put the word "scrapings" in quotes, because a scrape sounds harmless and does not convey what they actually did, which was pin her down and use a razor blade to remove samples of her skin. It made me want to cry.

It turnes out that the type of mite she has is not really contageous to humans or other dogs... she most likely got it while nursing, and the reason the hair loss only started to show recently was because her immune system was down from her initial set of vaccines.

The treatment sounds aweful, and I am dreading it. In addition to the disgusting-smelling pill I am throwing into her food bowl twice a day, we are going to have to do a "dip." There are several steps to this process. We have to start by putting protective drops into her eyes. Then we have to wash her with a special shampoo, and towel dry. Then we have to mix a dropperful of what is essentially an insecticide with a half gallon of water and pat her down with spongefulls of it until it is all gone. They said it smells terrible and that it should be done in a well-ventilated place and that we need to wear rubber gloves! I have to protect my skin from the stuff I am putting all over my dog! She then has to air-dry... She is so skinny and she is going to have to be in a room with an open window and it is freezing outside and I can't even bundle her up in a towel. I am also told that because it is such a strong chemical, she will seem like she is drunk for a couple days. OMG!!! We have to do this four times, too!

I can't believe the difference between getting a dog from a reputible breeder and getting a dog from someone who apparently went to some shady-as-shit operation where they leave out parasite-infested water and their breeding dogs have mange. Coconut came with papers to which all of the labels from her vaccines had been attached. I don't even know Marley's birthday.